Violence Tests the Security on Campuses

MINDY SINK

Sunday

Sep 30, 2007 at 5:27 AM

Over the summer, colleges and universities around the country revised campus violence policies and started additional mental health training, among other things.

As soon as university officials learned that two students had been shot at Delaware State University on Sept. 21, they acted quickly to limit access to the campus and notify students to stay in their rooms.

“The biggest thing we learned from Virginia Tech was when something happens, don’t wait,” said Carlos Holmes, director of news services at the university, in Dover, Del. Colleges and universities around the country have taken a second look at their safety policies since Seung-Hui Cho, a student at Virginia Polytechnic Institute, gunned down 32 people and then killed himself on April 16 on the campus in Blacksburg, Va.

Delaware State is not the only university to have its new security procedures tested this school year. Just last week at St. John’s University in Queens, officials used a text-messaging system to inform students and faculty members of a gunman on campus. The gunman, identified as a 22-year-old freshman, was quickly arrested. There were no injuries, but the university locked down the campus for three hours as officers searched for a possible second gunman.

University officials said that there were at least 10,000 students on campus at the time of the incident, but that thanks to the text-messaging system, security officers were able to direct them to safe locations in an orderly fashion.

On the first day of classes at the University of Colorado in Boulder in August, a text-message alert was sent from university officials: “Stabbing at UMC/suspect in custody/terrace closed.”

Michael Knorps, an 18-year-old freshman there, was chatting with friends on the University Memorial Center terrace when, officials said, a former cafeteria employee grabbed him and cut his throat before stabbing himself several times. Mr. Knorps was treated at a local hospital and released the same day. The suspect is a man with a history of mental illness and violent behavior, the authorities said.

On that first day of school, only 1,300 people were signed up for the new text-messaging alert system at the university, which has over 28,000 students enrolled. Within five days, nearly 8,000 had signed up.

“Everyone recognizes the tragedy at Virginia Tech was a wake-up call for colleges and universities across the country,” said W. Roger Webb, president of the University of Central Oklahoma in Edmond. “And sadly, expenditures on safety and security had been a lower priority. I think that has caused everyone to take a more serious look on what our first obligation is, and that is to protect our students.”

Even before Virginia Tech officials released their internal report and a state panel convened by Gov. Tim Kaine announced its findings late last month, university officials were all looking at similar issues: how to improve mental health awareness and access to counseling and then how to communicate as quickly as possible with students, faculty and staff members. Mr. Cho, 23, had a long history of mental illness and had expressed violent thoughts in schoolwork. After he killed two students in a dormitory on April 16, the campus police waited two hours to send out an e-mail message; by then Mr. Cho had repositioned himself on campus to kill 30 more people.

“What Virginia Tech showed was very similar to what Columbine showed us, and that is you are vulnerable no matter where you are,” said Alison Kiss, program director with Security on Campus, a nonprofit group in King of Prussia, Pa. “You have to take safety and security very seriously no matter where you are, and have proper plans in place.”

Over the summer, colleges and universities around the country revised campus violence policies, started additional mental health training, installed and activated new alert systems, and even ordered long-range rifles.

Officials at Colorado said they were motivated to make changes in security not only by the killings at Virginia Tech but also by incidents on their own campus last spring involving a knife-wielding student and a student whose talk of killing frightened others.

“Incidents of this nature have been occurring on college campuses for sometime,” said Chancellor G. P. Peterson. “But people became much more aware and cognizant in trying to determine what is the potential danger downstream.”

The university spent $25,000 on the text-messaging alert system — which also charges 6 cents for every message sent — and anticipates spending $150,000 more for a siren warning system. It also received a bid of $2.7 million for an electronic remote lockdown system for every building on the campus, though there are no immediate plans to install one. University football games will now start with an emergency evacuation plan posted on the video screen above the field.

Hofstra University has created an administrative job, director of emergency management, to oversee its proposed $750,000 emergency communications system that will include e-mail and cellphone alerts as well as remote building lockdowns.

At the University of Toledo in Ohio, the campus police ordered 15 long-range rifles at a cost of $13,800. “Many municipalities have these capabilities currently,” said Chief Jeff Newton of the campus police. “Universities are very much like cities and we have to keep up with what the community standard is and what expectations are.”

In addition, the University of Toledo spent $71,000 on additional deadbolts for residence hall rooms and $24,000 on a text-message alert system that officials said would be operating by October. Improving mental health awareness, access and communication while correctly following privacy laws is also a priority on many campuses. Mr. Cho’s mental health problems were recognized by some on campus, but that information was not shared with his family or with mental health workers.

At the University of Central Oklahoma, Mr. Webb, the president, said that the university had formed a relationship with the State Health Department to provide training to resident advisers and others to help identify and report students who were troubled or under psychological stress.

“For so long we had this code of silence, to let it be and not speak up,” Mr. Webb said. “We have a responsibility to provide a healthy learning environment for our students.”

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